Jack looked at him with a searing, mind-bending pain behind his dark eyes.

“I was called in to consult—I should not be telling you this. It doesn’t matter any longer. It emerged from the dark side of the moon at five a.m. over the Atlantic—Bermuda. A near earth body we never predicted, never identified, never guessed. It is not a meteor—has the characteristics of a comet. It will pass over in ten minutes and cut the continent in half at Memphis. We’ve got a half hour—the human race and anything more meaningful than a cockroach has less than a day.”

Mom—no, let her and Dad sit like this, like Jack and Louise.

Marie. Hell, she’s entertaining. Doing what she loves on her tiny stage. Let her and the rich boys go out with a smile.

He cut his phone off and tossed it over his shoulder—knocking back the entire glass, dumping it down his throat like acid rain into a storm gutter.

Louise spoke with the tone of admiration, “That was cool. You should have been a fighter pilot.”

He was not upset, had never realized that he placed so little value on his life until just this moment.

“I think you two have the right idea—not like those fools in the street hollering. You are the opposite of Adam and Eve.”

Where the hell did that come from?

Jack grinned. “And we thought you were just a likable jock! Here, have some more.”

The next glass was half wine, half vodka.

Louise smiled at him, her tears drying on her cheek and jaw. Jack tossed the vodka bottle and dragged a fifth of top shelf tequila from underneath their wicker loveseat. Louise then seemed concerned. “What about Marie?”

“She’s with clients right now. I doubt if they’ve, well, even stepped outside yet. She always cuts her phone off when she’s with clients—a professional courtesy.”

Jack was drinking and Louise was getting nosey. “We’ve never been clear on what you two do for a living. I mean, if you don’t mind, anything to pass the time.”

Jack grinned. “I’m a civilian contractor for naval intelligence, liaison to Homeland Security, specializing in sovereign airspace integrity. What about you and Marie, Sam, consulting, real estate?”

Louise cut in. “Oh, oh, let me guess: executive protection! You two are so good looking and fit, and Marie is just a bundle of confidence!”

He smiled and knocked back the entire glass. His mind lit on fire and he settled into the brilliant haze of enjoying inebriated company under a milky sky, lit by a distant sun and a ghostly red globe of fire.

Louise slapped his thigh. “Come on tell us. Tell us!”

He dropped his chin back to his chest but the vision of the flaming red orb hurdling through the eastern sky toward them did not leave his mind’s eye. They were both grinning at him, having found a friendly get-to-know-your-neighbor game to play in earth’s final moments. A gunshot rang out behind them and someone screamed. Louise with her wispy light brown hair and sparkling green eyes, and pastel dress, began to sink into a doomful state of worry again. Jack with his pasty face, lean angular lines, pinpoint black eyes and white dress shirt, gave him a look that hinted at diversion for his doom-filled wife.

“Okay, I’m a whore and Marie is my pimp.”

Their jaws fell slack and they just stared, no longer concerned seemingly for the falling sky above or the scattering people on the street beyond their Garden of Eden Lost. Louise was incredulous.

“What?”

“I attend the needs of women for compensation. Marie books the clients.”

Louise furrowed her soft brow. “And she is okay with that?”

“It bothers her less than it does me. As long as she is in control she’s okay with just about anything. It was her idea. She has clients too, male and female. I’m just for the ladies.”

Jack hooted and blurted, “So beautiful Mrs. Waterford is selling her ass as the world melts?”

Louise slapped her husband. “Jack, that was so crude!”

Sam interjected, “Almost precisely the words Marie would use. She’ll go out doing what she does best. I’m the one in danger of burnout. I’ve probably only got a few years left—shit, I’m retired by order of the Cosmos!”